Free Road Dogs (2009)( ) by Elmore - Jack Foley 02 Leonard

crowd at Venice Beach, the girls with long legs flying by on Rollerblades and it didn't help but didn't matter, Dawn came up like thunder, couldn't wait, Dawn the one dying to get it up to speed, and Foley revised his approach put the tender moves away until they did it again, Foley believed after a cigarette and a few sips of Old No. 7 and that was pretty much what happened when they settled down to restore their lust. But by the time they were at it again, getting into what he thought would be slow love, sail for a while kissing and grinning at each other, but they found themselves stepping it up and this act of love turned feverish, as wild and perspiring as the first one, Dawn sounding like she was dying but putting up a good fight, Foley, Foley in there performing, feeling himself into it and they finished in a dead heat, Foley believing he was in love again.
    He held her, kissed her hair, her ear, did all that, watched her breathe as she came back to earth, her lips parted, this innocent-looking girl with green eyes drawing him in as her little helper, knowing it was what he wanted before he did. She was psychic, clairvoyant better than that, this girl was everything an ex-con like Jack Foley could pray for. Thank you, Jesus. A girl you had to subdue to reach where you were going. But once she opened her eyes there she was, she was aware, she was with it, back in her skin. He turned her on and they were closer now.
    Intimate. She got out of bed and went in the bathroom, left the door open to sit on the toilet and smile at him.
    Did you have a good time?
    My heart, Foley said, soared like a hawk.
    You weren't bad yourself, Dawn said. You surprised me.
    She got back in bed with a cigarette to lie against the headboard now, Foley rubbing an ice cube over his chest, feeling male, satisfied. Dawn said, Did he tell you about the bank Little Jimmy runs, with the numbered accounts?
    Not much. It didn't sound like a bank.
    It is, Jack. It's a bank.
    This is only my second week outside, I'm still pure, clean, and you want to pull a bank job?
    There was a silence before she said, Jack ? and he turned his head to her.
    When Cundo was in prison he'd call and the first thing he'd say, he'd ask me if I was being a saint. Cundo believed saints never had sex. Are you being a saint for me?' 'Yes, I'm being a saint.' 'For me?' 'Yes, for you.' Finally I told him if he didn't stop asking if I was a fucking saint I'd disappear and he'd never see me again. And he did, he stopped saying it. Until last week, the day before you got here, he called and asked me again, after years of not asking, if I was being a saint. I said, 'All this time I've been alone?' I said, 'For more than seven years I've been waiting for you, and you ask me that all over again?'
    Did you ask him, Foley said, why he doesn't trust you?
    That's not the question, Dawn said. If he doesn't trust me, why did he invite you to come here?
    Fresh out of the joint, Foley said.
    Dawn nodded, looking at him.
    That's the question.
    Chapter NINE
    LOU ADAMS MET THE LAPD GANG SQUAD DETECTIVE AT THE Firehouse Bar on Rose Avenue. He knew Ron Deneweth from a police officer's funeral, the two sitting and talking after with a few beers. Lou still had Deneweth's card and called him once he'd decided to play this deal.
    Deneweth said, You know this place was actually a firehouse at one time?
    Is that right? Lou Adams said, waiting to look at the stack of rap sheets Deneweth was holding.
    Usually, Deneweth said, you see some of those muscle freaks from Gold's Gym in here. They sit at the bar sipping Red Bull looking at themselves in the mirror, every so often popping a bicep.
    Lou said, You gonna let me see those sheets?
    I don't know why you come to me, Deneweth said, all the federal programs you have. S. T. E. P. Street Terrorism Enforcement and Prevention. You have C. L. E. A. R. Community Law Enforcement and Recovery. H. E. A. T. Heightened Enforcement and Targeting. You have S. A. G. E.